V M Fisk

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VM FISK (Mads) was born and raised on a farm near the Blue Ridge Mountains of central Virginia. She studied painting and video art at California Institute of the Arts and sculpture at Virginia Commonwealth University.

Fisk explores shape, color, texture and pattern through, what she refers to as, “mild illusions”. Reminding the viewer that things may not always be as first perceived. These mild illusions are born from absent-minded doodles, which she practices as a form of meditation.

Excluding her dogs and family, Fisk’s favorite thing is watching a thunderstorm roll in, or a windy hay field.

EDUCATION

New York Film Academy, Film and Media Studies, Los Angeles, CA

Virginia Commonwealth University, Sculpture and Extended Media, Richmond, VA

California Institute of the Arts, Fine Art, Valencia, CA

 

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS

2021       Good Will, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA

2019       Glean, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA

2018       Teeny Tiny Trifecta, Second Street Gallery, Charlottesville, VA

What Everything is Made Of, Welcome Gallery, Charlottesville, VA (solo)

New City Artist Exchange, Welcome Gallery, Charlottesville, VA

2016       vm fisk, Austin Bouldering Project, Austin, TX (solo)

2015       Semi-Order, Proper, Austin, TX (solo)

Art + Tequila, Mexic-Arte Museum, Austin, TX

2014       Herradura Tequila Barrel Art Collection, Brazos Hall, Austin, TX

2009     Juried Student Fine Arts Exhibition, Anderson Gallery, Richmond, VA

2007      Performance Art, Armory Center for the Arts NW, Pasadena, CA

CalArts School of Fish Collaborative Art Show, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Lies and Confessions (CalArts), California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

 

SELECTED AWARDS

2014       Herradura Barrel Art Collection, Regional Winner, Austin, TX

 

SELECTED COLLECTIONS

Mexic-arte Museum Permanent Collection, Austin, TX

With Thought Traps and Mind Mazes, interdisciplinary artist VM Fisk (Richmond, VA) presents a series  of vibrant new works that explore a range of media. Born out of a period of intense self-discovery  following a diagnosis of adult attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), these abstract works  acknowledge and embody aspects of Fisk’s mental and artistic processes. Each piece is  simultaneously an illustration of a thought process and a cathartic meditation, as the artist engages  with sense-making through her studio practice and interrogates the ways in which her mind operates.

Here, Thought Traps and Mind Mazes offers a window into the ways Fisk is working through, and  working with, nuerodivergency. By combining various geometric forms with saturated color palettes,  the artist evokes a wide array of cognitive maps tinted with emotion. These works trace out the  pattern-making and connection-seeking tendencies of their creator’s mind, and draw attention to both  a literally and figuratively skewed perspective inherent within the artwork. Fisk’s bold use of color and  rhythmic quality of line signal energy and activity within these works, while the structures of cut panel  and paper substrates communicate both physical and visual weight throughout the series.

Functioning as stand-ins for her mental processes, Fisk’s works reflect the earnestness and  messiness associated with the artist’s ADHD. Even while acting as, and illustrating, meditative  practices, these works communicate a flurry of action and urgency. What appear to be finely finished  and exacting compositions are revealed to be imperfect approximations when the works are examined  up close. These imperfections — errant brushstrokes, raised seams, uneven layers — reveal the  history of the making, the actions Fisk has undertaken to produce her visions. Ultimately, this leads  viewers to understand that the process of working, of laboring with both the physical and metaphysical  elements of being, is central to the essence of the work itself.